Application of Game Mechanics
by HighLevelGAMER
Summary: Having suffered abuse and neglect, Mail escapes into a fictional world all his own. But even there, all is not as it seems.


**Title: Application of Game Mechanics  
**

**Summary: Having suffered abuse and neglect, Mail escapes into a fictional world all his own. But even there, all is not as it seems.  
**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note or anything referenced.**

...

* * *

Long sleeves, striped in the most clever manner; his own personal statement, but also his biggest lie. Stripes of two colors to represent how torn he felt, and to cohesively suggest the snag brought upon him by circumstance meeting reality. But the material itself served as a barrier, a hideaway, a desperado for woes untold. He needed that bit of privacy, though he was always careful to hide the bruises, quick to fabricate a good excuse.

_"Mommy had a meeting at work, and dad's sick with the flu! That's why they didn't show up today." _Words for school, when his parents had missed a play or an important meeting.

_"Oh, I just fell off my bike while riding down the hill! I was racing one of my friends, and..." _Words for the doctor during his checkup. After all, the ugly stains of blue and purple had to come from somewhere.

_"No, it's okay. I'm grounded. Maybe next time?" _To the little cootie-infested girl who wanted to hold his hand and walk him home.

But that was a lie -most of what he said had little or no truth. A work of fiction brought to life by word of mouth, much like the practiced smile that spoke volumes of happiness. And he was happy... as long as he was alone, in front of a tv with a controller in hand. Other than that, he was plagued with nightmares made real: battles with no victor, only victims.

Even now, on this cold Saturday night, another battle was in the midst, but he did his best to avoid the conflict.

He shut the door, turned off the lights, and waited for his world to become all he knew it could be. Silent bliss. But the storm raging just a wall away persisted, with hard angry screams of voices grown haggard.

Giving up on silence, the boy took a deep breath and turned on the tv, set up his PS2 and powered it on. Finally, he exhaled as the title screen came into view. Blue heavens with white expansions of cloud and an airship cutting through the middle.

"I could be a skypirate," the boy mused with a small smile, referencing the game that was easily his most prized possession. "I could pilot an airship... and go anywhere. As far away... from here... as I want." He closed his eyes and took on a look of serenity as he loaded his game and checked over his stats. Less than twenty hours into the game, and his main protagonist had already reached Lv 46. Of course, a lot of that time was eaten away by harmless tomfoolery.

Many times he'd caught himself running into Giza during a dry season, adjusting his camera angle and simply watching the docile little rabbits skitter about on their hind legs.

But now was not a time to go rabbit-watching. Now was a time to make a trip to a Shop to buy restorative Items. The transaction was fast, as the gamer rapid-clicked through the chat log offered by the NPC Shop Clerk. Then he began to trek east in favor of completing a small side quest.

But the gamer -a goggled boy with hair so red that it put the Flame Staff to shame- couldn't help staring at his character with a look of longing. Then, not for the first time, he changed the configuration of his game and opened the Battle Menu, adjusting his camera angle so that he could fully view the character's face, and then he spoke softly... voice barely above a whisper.

"... I envy you, y'know." He looked into a set of raster blue eyes set in a determined glare. "You're an orphan, so you don't have to listen to your parents fight. You're sad sometimes, but you've got friends and a life of adventure! You're going to be a skypirate by the end of the game, even if you're just a street urchin to begin with." Staring at the character on screen, the gamer sniffled and wiped his watery eyes. "My parents always fight. I wish I could just... live in the game. With you. With the other characters. Even with the war going on, it seems better than home. I wanna be a skypirate, slay beasts, and gain a sense of pride and nobility by completing quests."

The redhead habitually found his gaze traveling away from the screen, knowing the internal struggle with how difficult it could be to maintain eye contact with even a fictional person.

"I wish it were that easy," he said, voice barely audible even to himself. "I wish I could just put on some armor and grab a sword, save the day, and get my happy ending." With those words, he scrunched up his face, squinted his eyes and fought back an onslaught of tears, doing his best to breathe evenly despite his body's natural desire to heave and sob with the lurch of emotion.

Mere seconds seemed to pass before a loud thump met his ears and stilled his heart. Then another thump that was punctuated with a grunt. Then another. The noise got louder as it drew closer. Louder, angrier. Harsher.

The redhead could just imagine how the violence between his parents escalated with every slap or shove or slew of vulgarity. With the fight seeming to move closer to the boy's room, he figured it was only a matter of time before he found himself drug into the middle. Again.

Exiting the Battle Menu and pausing his game, the boy crawled into the corner and sat with his knees drawn to his chest. He closed his eyes and took deep breaths and didn't even bother to dry the tears that licked little wet lines down his face, strangely offering more comfort than any human ever had.

As predicted, the noises grew in both decibel and intensity, and soon it was right outside his door.

_THUMP._

Surely, one of his parents were being knocked around. Stereotypically, it would be the mother, but he knew for a fact that his mom could hold her own.

His father was a deadbeat, jobless alcoholic with a temper that could put Bruce Banner to shame. His mother was a larger woman in every sense. Tall, burly, broad shoulders, and more muscles than most men in WWE. In fact, it was probably his father who was getting battered and pummeled and pushed around.

Regardless, the boy held no sympathy for either parental; they deserved one another.

Still, the redheaded child of eight just wanted to be anywhere other than where he was at that moment. Especially when there was a particular cracking sound and his door was broken inwards, wood splintering and small pieces falling to the floor. The fight spilled into his room, his mother in her too-small neglige and bulging biceps, and his father angry and trying desperately to break free and hit her with an empty vodka bottle held tight in his grip.

Then, it happened. His father's slurred words, the telltale blame-switcher "and besides, it's all that damn brat's fault! Mail fucked everything up. Should've been aborted!"

And the fighting ceased; time stood still for a fraction of a second. For a moment, there was no RealTime play. The infamous 'still screen' effect prior to a cut scene.

The mother got off the father and together they turned focus and looked in the direction of their child.

The boy just sat there, motionless, hoping to fade into the wall. A vanishing act, like magic. An illusion of stealth to bring him safety. But it was pointless. There was nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. Just a straight shot between himself and the merciless duo.

As his parents approached, he imagined them to be large ominous beings in the form of blade-toting behemoths. He curled his toes and awaited their sharp weapons to bear down on him, and he pretended not to notice the crash of a bottle as it was thrown off to the side before hands grabbed at him, pulling his hair and clothes. Nails raked his arms and a slap was lain to his face. He didn't struggle; he resigned. But in his mind, he imagined beautiful pixels forming graphics. Elegant landscapes and creatures of all sorts. He imagined the stretch of land: a desert-esque region, and bunnies running on their hind legs, wiggling their cotton tails that easily doubled the size of their animated bodies. He imagined wolves and hyenas roaming the sands near the remains of fallen timbers that have long since begun to decompose. He thought of large human-sized birds running about and creating small gusts of wind with robust flaps of the wing. He imagined himself as a chiseled protagonist, wearing the necessarily protective garb as he braved the elements in favor of progression.

He felt safe in this imaginary world, full of wonder and monsters.

Suddenly, his bruises didn't matter; his sleeves no longer bore any significance. The screaming and thumping and fighting didn't matter; that was merely background noise that he could eventually block out. Like the thudding of footsteps when crossing a wooden bridge...

This wasn't living. This wasn't life. This wasn't much of anything.

Mail, all red hair and veiled eyes, didn't mean anything.

He was fictional. Everything was.

Exactly as it should be.

Exactly what he needed it to be.

Opening his eyes to find his parents still looming, their hands open like talons and ready to attack, the redhead dodged to the side and narrowly escaped an oncoming blow. Breath coming in small nervous gasps, he scampered to his feet and ran from his room, trying to calm his racing heart as he heard the booming footsteps that trailed after him.

The clamor of foes in tow, a chase of sorts. He lured them, body moving faster than his mind. Almost on auto-pilot.

He lacked a weapon; he lacked armor or a shield. But he did not lack the heart of a would-be protagonist.

Quickly making his way from his room to that of his parents, he bumbled over to the dresser drawer, from which he retrieved a pre-loaded S&W .38 Special revolver. He barely registered the feel of the cool heavy metal that gradually became heated in his sweaty little hands as he turned the weapon toward the overbearing behemoths.

He locked eyes with one, and then the other, finding nothing but malicious intent behind their luminescent gaze.

His breath caught, but his heart beat strong. His mind fogged over with static, principles be damned.

Clicking the safety off, he imagined the target lines connecting himself and his foes, like in the game. Then, his finger pulled. For a tenth of a second, he felt the metal move, guided by his flesh; he heard the soft click. With standard recoil, the bullet exploded. The sonic boom from the gun left the boy's ears ringing, and before he could second guess himself, he shot again. And again and again, until the revolver was rounding empty. With surprising accuracy, considering the drawback of recoil and the child's lack of experience, the first two bullets had been perfect head-shots, and sure enough, two bodies fell into a grotesque heap of flesh, blood, and liquor breath.

The foul stench of decay steadily filled the small room, and the boy just stood there, motionless. Eyes wide and unseeing.

There was no chime of victory music. There was no instant gratification. Nothing but the strain of nerves and the undulation of unreadable expressions that varied only slightly from one another.

An eternity of seconds became a few short minutes.

Then, the boy's face split into a nervous grin and he whispered "F-Five hundred and twenty three... EXP." His little hands shook as he finally lowered the gun. He bit his lip and stared at the corpses on the floor, trying to feel some form or remorse for what he'd just done. But no matter how hard he tried, all he could really focus on was the silence.

There was no yelling, no screaming, no thumping, and no fighting.

Silence alone made him feel calm and serene.

The more he thought about it, the less the deceased couple seemed like a mother and father. He could only look at them like fallen behemoths. Vanquished monsters. They did little more than roam about and destroy; perhaps it was a good thing for them to be slain.

Without his parents, there was nothing holding him back, chaining him to the life he'd been living.

Finding contentment and casting his nervousness aside, the boy put the safety on and slipped the gun into his pants and hid the bulk beneath his over-sized shirt -like in the movies. Then he went back to his room and grabbed a backpack -after all, he was going to need provisions. He packed a notebook, a change of clothes, a couple bars of chocolate and a handheld. He put on a warm vest and a pair of shoes and simply walked through the house, looking around in a curious manner and wordlessly bidding farewell to the only home he'd ever known.

Goodbye to the living room where his father drank and watched ESPN. Goodbye to the kitchen his mom had stopped cooking in. Goodbye to everything he couldn't be bothered to hold onto.

It was bittersweet, but mostly bitter. The only sweetness to be had was the fact that he was leaving, opting for a better life.

There was no sadness to be had. Now an orphan -on purpose- and without any friends, he was going to have a life of adventure, and maybe... maybe become a skypirate one day.


End file.
